the heart as it is | courage • grief • beauty

These are the days of…

Being able to cook things I want to cook at our new place ! Including…

• Fried rice (ingredients):

• Nice, filling breakfast (this is Jacob’s breakfast):

• An herbal congee dish whose recipe I grabbed from Elix healing’s instagram ! I found out I put too much ginger and too much lotus seeds… but now I know what not to do next time! I used purple yam, ginger, millet, bone broth, lotus seeds, jujube seeds. It was quite tasty and I felt so accomplished making my first herbal soup as someone with Taiwanese heritage:

… of peonies being in season :

… of hanging out with JJ at work:

… eating at the renowned Jang Su Jang for the first time:

Going to Wilder State Ranch to hike in Santa Cruz and seeing wildlife, then going to my first Santa Cruz Farmers’ market (I have film photos from here too that I will share later):

…beginning to attend a new church plant that we are both excited about that is closer to where we live. They had a unique story night with people sharing moments in their lives pertaining to love, loss, and transformation. We all got dinner afterwards and I noticed this beautiful tree nearby:

… playing actual video games ! I’ve only really played Maplestory, but Jacob got us a Switch, so I made us some Miis, and we also completed the first game of Moving Out:

… and learning to make my own coffee with a French press! It has taken me a bit of time… I already have been using a French press for a long time with teas. I also have been buying a lot of coffee from Starbucks and wanted to save money, so I finally just bought my own coffee grounds for the first time (medium-coarse grind). It’s a tricky process as it’s not the most common way of making coffee, which is pour-over. First, I put in a few spoonfuls of the coffee grounds (I notice I need to put in a lot with this coarser grind), then I fill in some water to about the same amount of the grounds and stir for a bit. After stirring, I then fill up the press with the amount of hot water I would like, usually a little bit more though because I notice the grounds will absorb the hot water. I let it sit for about 5 minutes, then I take out the foam-looking stuff at the top, which apparently is what makes it taste weird (I didn’t know this initially so couldn’t figure out why the amazing-smelling coffee I bought was tasting so gross). Then, I let it sit for another 3 minutes. Usually during this last 3 minutes, I will warm up and froth some milk. Finally, I pour the coffee and milk together and make my own little latte ! Sometimes I add creamer, sometimes I don’t, but creamer helps with the flavor a teeny bit:

Thank you for reading !